The Imitation Game

Are you paying attention?

Good.

If you’re not listening carefully you will miss things.

Important things.

I will not pause, I will not repeat myself

and you will not interrupt me.

If you think that because you're sitting where you are

and I am sitting where I am

that you are in control of what is about to happen,

you're mistaken.

I am in control,

because I know things that you do not know.

Manchester Police Department. Please hold.

Looks like a break-in.

Residence of Turing, Alan.

Window's broken. Home's been ransacked.

Send a detective down, will you?

What I will need from you now

is a commitment.

You will listen closely and you will not judge me until I am finished.

If you cannot commit to this, then please leave the room.

Come in.

But if you choose to stay, remember, you chose to be here.

What happens from this moment forward is not my responsibility.

It's yours.

Pay attention.

What's all this, then?

Turing, Alan. Professor at King's.

- Seems to have been a burglary. - Oh? What of?

Well, that's just it. Nothing missing, really.

What's he doing in Manchester?

Something with machines.

The project at the NPL.

I checked but he won't say what it's on.

Professor Turing?

Detective Nock, Manchester Police.

Sergeant Staehl here tells me you had a burglary last night.

Professor Turing?

Take a step back and don't breathe heavily.

- Breathe? - (Alan) Undiluted cyanide.

It wouldn't take more than a thimbleful to kill you.

Ah.

- Disappointing. - Pardon?

I had hoped for a bit more.

Sergeant Staehl, is it just me or do you get the sense that we're being insulted?

Last night you had a break-in.

Your neighbour Mr. Springborn called to report the noise.

He said there was quite a ruckus.

Only you say nothing was taken. It's odd.

So how about you tell us what happened and we'll find the chap who did this.

Gentlemen,

I don't believe that you could find the chap that did this

if he walked up to you and spat in your face.

What I could use right now is not a bobby but a really good cleaning lady.

So unless one of you has an apron in your car,

I suggest you file your reports and leave me alone.

As you say, Professor Turing.

Best of luck with your cyanide.

I'll give you a quid if you can name me a more insufferable sod.

Seemed a bit forced, though, didn't it?

Don't know what you mean.

Well, if you didn't want a pair of bobbies

digging around in your personal affairs,

that'd have been a stellar way to make sure they don't.

Tell me you don't think this is suspicious.

I don't think this is suspicious.

A mysterious professor who won't admit

he's had something stolen from his house?

I think Alan Turing's hiding something.

War declared! 800,000 children evacuated!

German bombs on their way!

Get your papers here.

Fresh off the press.

War declared!

800,000 children evacuated!

German bombs expected soon!

Get your papers here.

Fresh off the press.

This morning, the British Ambassador in Berlin

handed the German government a final note,

stating that unless we heard from them

by 11 o'clock,

a state of war would exist between us.

I have to tell you now

that no such undertaking

has been received.

And that consequently,

this country is at war with Germany.

For the second time

in the lives of most of us,

we are at war.

We have tried to find

a peaceful way out...

Papers, please.

- What are you doing here? - Uh, the lady told me to wait.

In my office?

Did she tell you to help yourself to tea while you were here?

Uh... No, she didn't.

She obviously didn't tell you what a joke was then, either, I gather?

Was she supposed to?

- Who are you? - Alan Turing.

- Ah, Turing. The mathematician. - Correct.

However could I have guessed?

You didn't. You just read it on that piece of paper.

King's College, Cambridge.

Now it says here you were a bit of a prodigy in the Maths Department.

I'm not sure I can evaluate that, Mr...

- How old are you, Mr. Turing? - Uh, 27.

And how old were you when you became a fellow at Cambridge?

Twenty-four.

And how old were you when you published this paper

that has a title that I can barely understand?

Uh, 23.

And you don't think that qualifies you as a certified prodigy?

Well, Newton discovered Binomial Theorem aged 22.

Einstein wrote four papers that changed the world by the age of 26.

As far as I can tell, I've... (chuckles) I've barely made par.

- My God, you're serious. - Would you prefer I made a joke?

Oh, I don't think you know what those are.

Hardly seems fair that that's a requirement

for employment here, Mr...

Commander Denniston, Royal Navy.

All right, Mr. Turing, I'll bite.

Why do you wish to work for His Majesty's Government?

Oh, I don't, really.

Are you a bleeding pacifist?

I'm agnostic about violence.

But you do realise that 600 miles away from London

there's this nasty little chap called Hitler

who wants to engulf Europe in tyranny?

Politics isn't really my area of expertise.

Really?

Well, I believe you've just set the record

for the shortest job interview in British military history.

Oh, uh... (chuckles)

Mother says I can be off-putting sometimes

on account of being one of the best mathematicians in the world.

- In the world? - Oh, yes.

Do you know how many people I've rejected for this programme?

- No. - That's right.

Because we're a top secret programme.

But I'll tell you, just because we're friends,

that only last week I rejected one of our great nation's top linguists.

Knows German better than Bertolt Brecht.

- I don't speak German. - What?

I don't speak German.

Well, how the hell are you supposed to decrypt German communications

if you don't... (chuckles) I don't know, speak German?

Well, I'm really quite excellent at crossword puzzles.

Margaret!

German codes are a puzzle. A game just like any other game.

- Margaret, where are you? - I'm really very good at games,

uh, puzzles.

And this is the most difficult puzzle in the world.

Margaret!

For the love of God.

This is a joke, obviously.

I'm afraid I don't know what those are, Commander Denniston.

Have a pleasant trip back to Cambridge, Professor.

Enigma.

You called for me?

That's what you're doing here. The top secret programme at Bletchley.

You're trying to break the German Enigma machine.

What makes you think that?

It's the greatest encryption device in history

and the Germans use it for all major communications.

If the Allies broke Enigma, well,

this would turn into a very short war indeed.

Of course that's what you're working on.

You also haven't got anywhere with it.

If you had, you wouldn't be hiring cryptographers out of university.

You need me a lot more than I need you.

I... I like solving problems, Commander.

And Enigma is the most difficult problem in the world.

Oh, Enigma isn't difficult. It's impossible.

The Americans, the Russians, the French,

the Germans. Everyone thinks Enigma is unbreakable.

Good. Let me try, then we'll know for sure, won't we?

Welcome to Enigma.

The details of every surprise attack, every secret convoy,

and every U-boat in the bloody Atlantic go into that thing

and out comes gibberish.

It's beautiful.

It's the crooked hand of death itself.

Our Wrens intercept thousands of radio messages a day.

And to the lovely young ladies of the Women's Royal Navy,

they're nonsense.

It's only when you feed them back into Enigma that they make any sense.

But we have an Enigma machine.

Yes, Polish Intelligence smuggled it out of Berlin.

So what's the problem?

Just put the intercepted messages back into the Enigma and...

Look, it's not that simple. Is it?

Just having an Enigma machine doesn't help you to decode the messages.

Very good, Mr. Turing.

To decode a message, you need to know the machine's settings.

Now, the Germans switch settings every day, promptly at midnight.

We usually intercept our first message around 6:00am.

Which gives you exactly 18 hours every day to crack the code

before it changes and you start again.